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How a Porn Movie Spawned German Crowd-Funding Start-Up

By

Stephan Dörner

Oct 5, 2012 10:47 am GMT

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Dennis Bemmann and Guido Sandler

It all started with porn.

Dennis Bemmann, after co-founding German social network StudiVZ and selling it for undisclosed millions, was already enjoying early retirement when he heard how a porn movie had been financed: crowd funding. Mr. Bemmann and his business partner, Guido Sandler, decided to use the concept to finance businesses and founded Bergfuerst AG.

Crowds show the power of the masses online. If enough people unite, they can finance projects from movies to the development of new products. On the crowd-funding platform Kickstarter, millions of dollars are collected—and in many cases teams aren’t able to demonstrate more than a prototype. Nor is it uncommon for investors to show interest in start-ups as soon as it becomes clear through Kickstarter that there is a market. The crowd, potential consumers, already decide in a product’s development phase if it will be made.

Messrs. Bemmann and Sandler want to extend the crowd principle to corporate finance.